<p>Wow. A therapist would have a field day here. Psst … You’re not doing your kid any favors by not having him make his bed and do simple chores. What’s your goal here? An automaton or a person?</p>
<p>Cheeky monkey - the goal is learning, expanding one’s mind, and trying one’s reasonable best. The goal isn’t the A on the piece of paper. The A’s might flow from learning and working hard, but they aren’t the goal in and of themselves.</p>
<p>cheekymonkey – I think that if you are teaching your son, as you put it, “Why would anyone want to chose a life of deprivation when a life of relative luxury is awarded for good grades?” you are going to have bigger problems with him than having to push him to make As.</p>
<p>As far as your attitude toward the “ditch diggers”: There is absolutely nothing unworthy about manual labor, nor do you know whether those men did well in school. My children have all participated in church trips where they roofed houses, dug ditches, and generally worked their backsides off to help people who were in dire need. Rather than scorn hard, manual labor, they have a much better appreciation for the people who do it. Grades are important, but life lessons such as this are far more so. I tell them that doing well in school and getting a college education (things I very highly value) will give them more choices, but I don’t even imply that in doing so they would be somehow better than anyone else.</p>
<p>By the way, two of my high school classmates who were C students started out working construction after graduation and now own their own companies building $1,000,000+ houses. Even with the recession, they are living lives of “relative luxury”.</p>
<p>I spent enough years in college (14) to have learned that the difference between an A and a B is largely the professor or grading scheme as much as it is the effort the student puts. As I said, most of the praise in straight A’s is not intelligence - there’s a fine line between an A and a B - but the ability to not lose focus on what it takes to not lose the A. </p>
<p>I often compare this to Michael Jordan. He was an awesome player, granted, but one thing that stood out about him was that he never had a bad game. he always played like it’s the NBA final game 7 overtime. So, it’s not just how smart someone is, or even how much effort he/she puts into it, it’s a lot about how they think. What’s good enough?</p>
<p>Agree completely w Marsian. Your attitude towards manual labor is less than impressive.</p>
<p>Cheeky monkey - welcome to America, where success in life isn’t dependent on grades the way you think it is.</p>
<p>My D’s school honors any graduating senior who has maintained an UW4.0 throughout their high school career as a valedictorian. In a school of 500 graduating seniors there are exactly 5 valedictorians. To ‘demand’ straight A’s from your child is both unrealistic and IMHO fraught with disappointment and unnecessary stress to your child.</p>